Comments

Comment by Gorelash

A no-tank fight. He just runs around "Energizing Cores" around his little platform. Each time he casts this, it damages (4, I think) members of the party, so healers have to keep everyone up. Other than that, burn him down.

Comment by Marliene

Did this on heroic on Murmur premade realm as a warrior

Using minimal real tanking gear he hits for about 2-4k a hit which was easy to heal through.

He also has 2 major abilities:

-He summons a dragon from the sky and it will periodically cast a beam that follows one member of the raid around and does damage. It leaves a very short trail. It can target the tank and whoever gets it should run away.

-He will cast a 180 degree cone attack that shoots everything between him and one of the four rocks around him every 7(?) seconds or so. He casts this in a counterclockwise rotation and the simplest method to avoid this is to have everyone in the group look at the rock that will be his target next and just get out of his line of fire for the next attack. If you do get hit by the beam, it only does about 5-7k damage, but minimizing this is what gives a kill.

Comment by Bastilla

Tactic for heroic:

Tank schould stand still an not move. Eat the lightnings but move away from the Felmyst like ray.

DDs move away when he charges up his lightning, it hits for 7k on heroic an move away from the ray. You see the area the lightning will go to for a brief time, and should have enough time to move out of it.

Healer keep the tank alive.

Comment by Xelestra

Varos shoots two different thicknesses of lasers after a brief tank-and-spank phase. There are 4-5 beams connecting Varos' body during his spell to the orbs on the outer edge. The first set (very thin) lasers cause no damage whatsoever and are used as an indicator of where the DPS should NOT be standing. The second set of lasers (thick and painful) are exactly where the thin ones previously were and will fry whoever is standing within for up to 7-8k on Heroic. Just like a bug-zapper. You have around 3-4 seconds between sets of lasers to move yourself. The whole group will basically be strafing around in giant circles to get on the side of the platform the boss isn't currently marking, with the tank eating up zaps. When done correctly, the tank should be the only one getting hit.

Comment by Mith

On Heroic Mode, the tank does not have to eat the energy webs. The webs come a lot more often, but they always go in a counter-clockwise rotation around the room. Tank stands in the center and just moves in a slow little circle to stay out of the energy webs.

Other than that, avoid the eye beam and you're good to go.

Comment by liatania1azuremy

your all wrong as to how this fight should go

he has two different ways he tries to kill your group.

1. he will shoot lightning beams from his hands. these go in a counterclockwise pattern. the best way to counter act this is to have your tank circle around the group, which will be standing in the middle. the tanks job is to make sure that the group is not in the lightning. doign this fight this way will insure maxium healign and dps ability if you have ranged dps. keep in mind that the tank does not have to been in the lightning. just make sure you are between the boss and yoru group.

2. he will summon a dragon who shoots out a lazer beam. this beam will follow the person its cast on. your group should be standing in the middle of the platform and spread out. this will ensure that the persont he beam is on wil be able to run away from the group.

using this strat will garuntee that you will win this fight.

Comment by neojackal

Just a bit of clarity on the webs from my experience. He'll mark where he's going to call in an airstrike from a dragon by shooting the thin lightning to the orbs. The closer you are to him rather than further out on the platform, the easier it is to move fast. Otherwise, you're going to have difficulty avoiding, because he chains this attack.

Comment by Kalrok

The first poster says to eat the lightning -- Don't do that. It is completely unnecessary and will make running this on heroic with a paladin/shaman healing a total pain in the ass.

(Note that this is his lightning ability which looks like electrical shocks shooting out of the bosses body. This is NOT the plasmic looking beam that the dragons spray at random players.)

The way the lightning works is if you think of the platform hes standing on as a pie chart or the face of a clock; If he's standing in the middle he'll do his charge animation which will be thin bolts going from him to the orbs that surround the platform, this lightning will cover approximately 1/4 of the platform (Noon to 3 using clock analogy.) Which means 3/4 of the space on the platform is always safe.

Tank him in the middle, avoid the lightning, run from the beams, collet loot.

Oculus is an instance where knowledge far surpasses individual ability and gear, if you know what you're doing it will be very easy, if you don't it will be a pain in the ass regardless of how geared you are.

Comment by Lucavious

Tanks: Tank him directly in the center of the platform and try to keep him from moving as little as possible. Take note of the small lasers (Check this video if you need to see them) and make sure you're not standing in them. You should be able to easily avoid the laser damage. If you find yourself being fried by the thick laser just stand your ground and allow the healer to heal you through it.

DPS / Healer: Stay close to the tank for the duration of the fight, as close as possible. When you see the small lasers appear and you are close to the tank you should have no problems moving to a safe spot. Occasionally a bright, thick laser will appear and start chasing after a single person. This is just like the Riding Hood fight in Karazhan, you need to stop doing damage and start running. Healers resort to instant cast heals if it's coming after you.

If nobody is standing in the danger zone then nobody should ever be taking damage. It is very possible to come out of this fight without taking any damage if you pay attention to your surroundings. In normal mode it's possible to heal through the laser damage but in Heroic you will be demolished right from the start if you can't manage to avoid the laser explosions.

Lastly, it helps to zoom out your camera as far as possible. Type the following command into your chat window and it will allow you to zoom further out than the default camera settings allow and make managing this fight much easier.

/console cameraDistanceMaxFactor 4

Comment by zefla

Easy fight once you understand it, before that its incredibly frustrating . I suggest zooming out the camera and looking down, in order to see where the lazors are.

Comment by Femalemage

Why didn't anyone tell anything about the drakes that spawn? We are going to try to keep one or two people airbourne all the time.

Comment by Norseguy

After about 7 wipes we gave it up, people just weren't moving fast enough.

Comment by ranikotar

this platform is like a pie cut into quarters he will charge a section( the section covered with the small beams) get out of there or your gonna take heavy damage

* i have noticed he will do the charged sectionscounter clock-wise*

so as a tank just strafe around him when he charges another sectionas dps and heals stay very close to the tank ( but behind him)so you have less distance to run when he charges a section of his platformAnd if you have a laser beam on you as a dps please do not run across the healer if its after you, your just gonna get yelled at for it and maybe cause a wipe

*do not lose focus of whats going on this fight requires you to pay attention to your surrounding

The boss on reg melee's for about 2-3k(on me the tank)And the big beam ticks for about 1.8-2k ive notice

Comment by arsin29

We just did this boss in heroic and the one thing nobody mentioned is that you must keep running in a counter-clockwise circle - it's only mentioned to move in a counter-clockwise direction. So you should be running nearly non-stop with no more than 5 seconds to cast at any given time when your out of the aoe. It should also be noted that party members should stay very close to each other as well, making the movement more fluid. Also, the tank has the ability to at least control a little bit - how far out the beams will hit. I was able to make the area coverage a lot smaller by moving him towards the edge where the beams will hit giving dps more room on the other side.

Another note - the metaphorical "Pie" theory is only partially right. At least 45% of the time, half of the platform was covered by the beam. The other times, it was actually pie shaped. The idea to have the dps close and behind the tank is a good idea as well.

Comment by Zool114

Just did it in heroic with 2 hunters, a crit-chicken and a tree druid healing, with myself (warrior) tanking. Both hunters and the crit-chicken died around 90% because they were too far away to make it out of the lazers. I and the tree finished the rest of the fight ourselves. If you keep out of the quadrant lazers, the only big damage is the adds' strafing beams, and we found that as long as we weren't both being hit it was pretty trivial to heal through.

It probably wouldn't work with anything but a druid healer (HOTs and instant casts are very helpful considering how much you have to move), but this boss is 2-mannable.

For the record, I was sporting a little under 21k health and armor at the time, and a little over 540 defense, so it's not like I over-geared the place by much.

Comment by Zurr

lasers are bad, stay away.

Comment by rotier

Ranged DPS and possibly even the healer can stand on the 4 pillars around the platform, and take no damage.

Comment by Visui

Regular:Kill Dragons in the air before landing on the outer ring. ~will aggroTank stays as close to the center as possible. ~or dps will die to the haze.Ranged DPS stays with the tank. ~ MAX RANGE = DEATHPurple lazer lightshow is a warning. ~ get out of it fast or die Artillery frost bolt 3-4k dmg ~don't stand next to healer, its like an eyebeam of death

***Zoom out your camera and look down for a pie piece area shaded purple. Don't BE there. *** Lower graphics settings don't get as viable of a warning on the lasers. I feel your pain, my laptop still makes cubes on my head occasionally. /facepalm

Comment by Quacksaw

Someone should vote the drake-spawning post up, not down.

Remember, up doesn't just mean insightful, it means funny as well. I, for one, had a good laugh at it.

Edit: Those reporting drake spawns are either victims of a bug or are confused.

I honestly don't know where those thick laserbeams are coming from because I've got my eyes on my buff timers and whatnot, so maybe they're being breathed by un-targetable drakes.

Comment by CeeKay

Like has been said this boss is easily two manable if the tank and healer avoid the arcane lightning.

Healers must stay close to the boss to avoid the area effect arcane lightning that hits for 6-8k in heroic that affects 1/4 to 1/3 of the platform.

PS: if your dps are not moving out of the lightning or lazer don't even attempt to heal them. There is no reason for any dps to take any damage on this fight.

And if someone can't learn this fight in three attempts have /kick on macro.

Save yourself some gold on this fight and warn people at the begining if they are new.

Comment by guardianhero

Don't necessarily have to tank in the center, as the "pie piece" are blasted between the orbs and Cloudstrider.

The group I was with was having trouble seeing the first lasers and moving out of the way (same people who always died on Shade's Blizzard in Kara). I was tanking and simply grabbed the boss while the ranged dps and healer stood at the center about 10 yards apart from each other. The melee dps just followed me on the inside of the platform while we ran counter clockwise around the outside. Then the only issue was for me to kite the boss to the center orb for every explosion.

This requires only 1 person to watch out for for the energizing cores and causes the explosion to cover a much smaller portion of the platform than the usual 1/3 that it would be from tanking in the center. Even if I couldnt get back to the inside of the platform in time, the healer had no issue with healing through the damage on 1 target instead of the entire group. The only other issue was with the lasers from the Captains and all they had to worry about was to run away from everyone else.

Comment by dragonsslayer

As a tank, I just landed on edge, tanked him right there and rest of group dps'd him down. that simple, just moved a couple of feet to avoid beams either way. Trick is to not have pets pull him away so that gives u a wide area for group to stand in.

Comment by Kees

does he always look to the left?

Comment by Ski187

Interesting comment i found about this NPC on wowwiki:

"Varos Cloudstrider is the only drakonid in the game to have a last name, additionally his name would more commonly be used by a high elf or blood elf. This has led some players to speculate about whether Varos is a drakonid naturally or a mortal transformed into a drakonid, similar to Wyrmcult Blessed who transform into dragonspawn and (by speculation) Maxnar the Ashmaw who is also a drakonid."

(Maxnar is a black drakonid found in Blackwing Coven in Blade's Edge Mountains. He is half-man, half-dragon.)

thought it was pretty rare and worth sharing since nobody mentioned it :)

Comment by Daralyn

surprised that nobody said that you need to kill 10 centrifuge constructs to bring down his shield first

so for newcomers

4 are on main middle platform - just go around it like first platform lower and kill all mobs3 are on the southeast platform - with another mage mob3 are on the southwest platform - also with one mage

kill them all and shield around northern platform fade off

then it is adviced to kill drakes around (just in case they want to join the fight) and then nuke boss

profit

Comment by Jonathan82

He is strong and will willed

Comment by Jonathan82

And in lore it says he has the destiny of Dragon Soul

Comment by Jonathan82

He's the one that promoted deathwing to power.. HE is in real the REAL OG..

Comment by Jonathan82

RAWR!11

Comment by Moonwolf1

Well thought I'd try and solo to get the red hat for the Feast of Winter Veil, all was going fairly well untill I run into Varos Cloudstriker. I'm level 85 with no Decent Armor so had to try to use different Armors after dying 5 times decided that Mage armor would let me live a little bit longer, also I sent my Water Elemental to the otherside of the platform and let it cast first. I then hit with frost bolt and was hoping Ring of Frost would delay him (Some Hope) I cast Mirror Image and Blinked away from them and cast anything that was not on cooldownI had 1 decent healing potion on me and Heavy Embersilk Bandages, which I must add done no good at all as I had no free time to be helped by them ! Had a thick head moment ! well it worked out I had 3471 health left and thought I'd never drop him when on a last cast of Frostfire Bolt followed with Ice Lance, it was do or die or both, He uttered the words They are...too strong! Underestimated thier...Fortitude. Well I put my heart back as it was in my mouth as it seemed I was off to the Healing spirit, Again. so now I'm off to try Mage-Lord Urom. Thank You everyone who had put information on how to deal with him as a lot of your information was well handy. Ah one more thing Doing it on Heroic as it seems the Red Winter Hat only drops on Heroic level. Hope you enjoyed the read. Again, Thanks for all your comments on how to overcome this instance from the start to here.

Related

Overview

The fight against Varos involves a lot of party movement. Most of the time, one quarter/one third of the platform is occupied with lasers that connect Varos with the outer ring. Players will suffer high damage while standing there.

There are two kinds of lasers, the first harmless kind that indicates the direction of the second harmful one, and the second kind that actually deals damage.

Varos should be tanked in the middle to ease up movement.

Avoid the purple beams shot by Azure Ring Captains.

Overview

Varos Cloudstrider

Amplify Magic: Increases magic damage taken by up to 900 and healing taken by up to 1800. Lasts 30 seconds.

Arcane Beam
– Azure Ring Captains channel a beam of arcane energy at a player's location, inflicting Arcane damage to all players within 3 yards. As the beam is channeled it moves towards a random player.